William Blinn, an Emmy-winning screenwriter and producer who wrote for the landmark TV projects “Brian’s Song” and “Roots,” created the detective series “Starsky & Hutch” and co-wrote the Prince film “Purple Rain,” died Oct. 22 at an assisted-living community in Burbank, Calif. He was 83.
Mr. Blinn won Emmy and Peabody honors for the 1971 TV movie “Brian’s Song,” which dramatized the friendship of Chicago Bears players Gale Sayers (played by Billy Dee Williams) and Brian Piccolo (played by James Caan).
Adapted from a book by Sayers and journalist Al Silverman, the movie was a hit when it aired and remains an enduring favorite of sports fans, celebrated for its portrayal of an interracial friendship in the midst of the civil rights movement. The movie chronicled Piccolo’s cancer diagnosis and ended with his death, in 1970 at age 26; Sayers, a Hall of Fame running back, died last month at 77.
Mr. Blinn’s work on “Roots,” the blockbuster 1977 miniseries adapted from Alex Haley’s book about his Black ancestors in slavery and freedom, earned him an Emmy for an episode he co-wrote with Ernest Kinoy.
His daughter described Mr. Blinn as a “pioneer who went against the grain and wrote and created what he felt. . . . He wanted to create what really felt organic and authentic. He never acquiesced to the industry.”
William Frederick Blinn was born in Toledo on July 21, 1937. After graduating from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1957, he began writing for television, including on episodes of “My Favorite Martian” and westerns such as “Rawhide,” “Bonanza” and “Here Come the Brides.”
Mr. Blinn went on to create or develop shows such as “The Interns,” a CBS medical drama that premiered in 1970, and “Hunter,” a spy series starring James Franciscus. He partnered with producer Aaron Spelling on “The Rookies,” an ABC police procedural that ran for more than 90 episodes, and again on “Starsky & Hutch,” which featured Paul Michael Glaser and David Soul as a pair of police detectives who race across fictional Bay City, Calif., in a bright red Ford Gran Torino.
The series ran for four seasons beginning in 1975 and was later adapted into a 2004 movie, produced by Mr. Blinn and starring Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson.
Mr. Blinn also developed the series “Eight is Enough,” based on a book by journalist Tom Braden, and shared three Emmy nominations as an executive producer of the 1980s series “Fame,” about students and faculty at a New York performing arts school. The series led to his sole screenwriting credit on a feature film, for the rock musical “Purple Rain” (1984).
In a 2009 interview with Spin, Mr. Blinn recalled meeting Prince over Italian food in Hollywood. “What I remember more than anything was that he was the only person I had ever seen in my life who had pasta and orange drink,” he said. “I didn’t get it then, I don’t get it now, but what the hell. He had definite ideas of what he wanted to do — a generalized story line, broad strokes. It wasn’t his life, but it was about his life.”
Mr. Blinn recalled that his screenplay was initially “mysterious and offbeat” before being rewritten by Albert Magnoli, the film’s director. “Purple Rain” grossed $70 million, with Prince playing a rising rock singer known as the Kid and providing the rock music soundtrack.
Mr. Blinn later created “Heaven Help Us,” a short-lived 1994 fantasy series, and “Pensacola: Wings of Gold,” which ran from 1997 to 2000 and starred James Brolin as a naval aviator.
In addition to his daughter, survivors include his son, Chris, and several grandchildren.
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